Sweet Corn Cob Jelly

    I was recently gifted some lovely early bi-color sweet corn from some very good friends. Since it was more than we could eat at once I decided to prep it for the freezer following the directions on our site Cooking the Deals. As I was getting ready to take the clean cut corn cobs to the compost bin, I recalled seeing a recipe for Sweet Corn Cob Jelly on this site: Canning Homemade! I decided to give it a try, I followed the direction exactly as written and I have to admit that it was probably the easiest jelly recipe I have ever made. The jelly set perfectly and has a very light, sweet almost lemony floral flavor.

    Corn Cob Jelly

12 large corncobs

4 cups sugar

4 cups water

1 package powdered pectin

yellow food color ( optional)

    Prepare 7 half pint jars, lids and rings. Sterilize the jars and keep them in hot water until ready to use. Cut corn kernels from cobs and save for canning or freezing. It is not necessary to cut right to the core. 

    In a large stainless steel pot add corncobs and water. Heat to a full boil for 10 minutes. Remove the corncobs and using cheesecloth strain the liquid. You will need to measure 3 cups. (Add water if necessary or add additional water to corncobs and boil again to get the full 3 cups.) Put the strained liquid back into the pot and add stir in the pectin. Bring to a full boil. Add in the sugar and bring back to a rolling boil. Turn off the heat. If necessary skim off any foam with a metal spoon. If you want add a few drops of the yellow food coloring at this point. 

    On a dishtowel place your hot jars and fill leaving 1/4" head space. Using a clean damp cloth wipe the jar rims removing any liquid jelly that would interfere with a good seal. Place lids on the jars and seal with the rings to 'finger tight'. 

    Process the jars in a water bath canner following proper water bath canning procedures and process for 10 minutes starting to time after the water has come to a boil. Turn off the heat and allow the jars to sit a few minutes before removing, set the jars on a dishtowel in a place where they can sit overnight without being disturbed.   

  Sometime within the next hour you will hear the pinging or popping noise as the jars cool and seal. If you have any jars that have not sealed reprocess them the following day or put in the fridge for immediate consumption.   Be sure to properly label and store the jars.  

This recipe is an excellent way to get even more from your produce. So this lovely gift of a dozen ears of corn netted a total of one dinner,

seven containers for the freezer for future dinners and one pint and 3 half pints of sweet corn cob jelly. This will definitely be one for must make file!

Cucumber Chips

What do you do with garden cucumbers too large for pickles and too many to eat before they go soft? Make cucumber chips in three flavors...garlic herb, ranch and sea salt vinegar... a healthy no guilt snack that is easy to make.

Slice your cucumbers approximately 1/8 inch thick either by hand or with a mandolin into a bowl. Add just enough olive oil to just barely coat the cucumber slices and toss gently. The olive oil can be optional, it mainly aids in keeping the cucumber chips from sticking to the trays for easy removal but is best if you plan on eating the chips in a short amount of time the oil can soften the chips again over time. For longer term storage, omit the olive oil, any seasoning you add will cling to the damp slices and stay once dehydrated. ( I personally prefer them without the addition of the olive oil.) Place the sliced cucumbers on your dehydrator trays (to prevent sticking you can very lightly spray the trays wiping off any excess with a vegetable oil like Pam) and lightly sprinkle with your seasoning of choice. I made two trays each of three different flavors.

The first was ranch using Hidden Valley powdered ranch seasoning and dressing mix.

The next two trays were made using the Weber Roasted Garlic and Herb seasoning, this seasoning is great on any vegetable.

Lastly, before placing the last of the cucumbers on the dehydrator I added some balsamic vinegar and after placing them on the trays I sprinkled lightly with Morton sea salt however a kosher salt or any larger grained salt would also work well.

I have also experimented with a light basting of Frank's Hot Sauce for a buffalo version that is simply amazing with humus as a dip...or even a blue cheese dressing dip.

For a little sweeter version try brushing with a balsamic vinegar reduction and sea salt a less tangy version of the straight balsamic vinegar sea salt.

Place your trays in your dehydrator and set at 125 degrees and dry for approximately 4-6 hours or until they are crisp. Times will vary due to temperature and humidity levels in your area and the moisture content of the cucumbers being dehydrated.

If you plan on storing the chips long term, omit the olive oil as it can soften your crisp chip to a more leather like chip over time. If you have a Food Saver vacuuming system for mason jars it helps to vacuum seal the jars. Another option is to use oxygen absorbents instead or in conjunction with the Food Saver vacuum system.

These make a great, guilt free healthy snack.

Enjoy!

My Best Buy Buys 3/30/12

Guess how much the hubbs paid for this out of his allowance...

Go ahead, guess!
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Did you guess $1.90? (If you did, you're right!) We have a Best Buy Rewards Zone card where he had a $5 credit, then using his Shopkick app on his phone (see below for more details on Shopkick), he had earned another $15 credit to Best Buy. The game was $19.99, and to use all $20 credit, the total before tax had to be $20 or more, so he bought a Sprite to go with it.

With ShopKick, you earn points by "checking in" at various stores like Best Buy, Target, Old Navy, Macy's, American Eagle, Aeri, and others. ShopKick also offers you the chance to scan certain random items to earn more points (10 to 25, and even up to 100 points). When you get to 500 points you have earned a $2 gift card (though not all stores offer the $2 amount). You can get gift cards in various amounts ($2, $5, $10, $20, $25, $50, and even $100), and for the most part once you redeem points for a gift card, you are given a code or barcode to give to the cashier at checkout. You can get gift cards to stores like Best Buy, Target, Starbucks, iTunes, Macy's, Old Navy, Toys R Us/ Babies R Us, Lowe's, CVS, and more!

Use the link below to download the app to your smartphone 
http://get.shopkick.com/hornet9061

Make Your Own Hand Soap

Back a while ago, I found, what I thought, was a really good deal on Dial Foaming soap refills for $1.94 (with coupons, of course!). Turns out if I read the package, it wasn't foaming. So I was trying to find pump bottles laying around our house that would work when I came across a recipe to make foaming hand soap out of liquid hand soap. Well, I tried it, but wasn't too impressed. I liked the concept, but figured I could improve it. So, I did!

I didn't think it was foamy enough, so I used more soap. So, here's my improved recipe... (though I don't pull out my measuring spoons when I make it, I just eyeball it!)

Fill your foaming soap pump to about 1/4 inch below the "fill here" line with warm or hot water. Add about 1 tablespoon of liquid hand soap. (I've also heard using dish soap works, but haven't tried it.) Put the top back on and shake to get all of the soap dissolved in the water. Viola! Done!

How to Freeze Sweet Corn

I love sweet corn on the cob in the summer! It's hard to get year round though, but if you buy some now, and freeze it for later, it's just about as good. My mom and I did just that today. She stopped by a local farm stand, that she's been going to for years to get corn, and picked up 4 dozen ears of corn for $20 (about 42 cents an ear). So, today I helped her freeze it. Here's how we did it, so that you can enjoy sweet corn off the cob all year round too!

1. Husk the corn. This is best done outside, as it get pretty messy! We threw the husk in the garden compost to make great soil for her garden next year.

Cute helpers always help get the job done!

2. Cut the corn off the cob. I saw a pin on Pinterest about using a bunt cake pan and an electric knife. We tried it out, and it worked great! Having tried it, I have two suggestions though. If you have your choice of bunt cake pans, choose the one that all once piece (I used the one that was two pieces, and the corn juice leaked out the bottom). Also, if you have the choice, I think the one with the smaller hole in the middle would work better than the bigger hole (I had an ear of corn slip right through it at one point!). Either way the electric knife makes it go WAY faster, and the bunt pan is great for catching all the kernels.

3. Clean the cob off. Some might say this is an optional step, as you have all the kernels, but you don't always get it all when you slice it off, so my mom took the cobs and held her knife perpendicular to the cob and ran it down all the sides. I guess we like to get every little last bit of the yummy stuff!

(Want to know what to do with the empty cobs? Check out this jelly recipe!)

4. Cook the corn. You're not cooking it entirely, but kind of like blanching it before you freeze it. This is the recipe we've been using for years. For the amount that we did, we had to use my mom's stock pot. If you're doing it on a smaller scale, you can use a smaller pot. Or, if you're doing a large amount, and don't have a stock pot, you can use several pots or do it in smaller batches.

8 cups raw sweet corn 
3/4 cup water
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1/2 to 3/4 stick butter or margarine (we probably used less than this, because when we're ready to eat it, we add more butter)

Bring to a boil, cook 3 minutes. Cool.

5. Package, label, & freeze. If you follow my blog, you know I always use empty sour cream, yogurt, butter, or other containers for freezer meals. Corn is no different! If you're not going to fill it all the way full, I would suggest putting a layer of cellophane right on top of the corn so there's less air around it to cause freezer burn.

(The ones in the box mom sent home with me!)

So from our 4 dozen ears of corn, we got 17 - 16 ounce containers, 3 - 12 ounce containers, and 14 - 8 ounce containers, or about 26 - 16 ounce bags that you would buy in the store. That's about 76 cents per bag, which is more than what I typically pay for frozen veggies, but I think the taste is totally worth it!

EDIT: We did this again this year (2015), but did 6 dozen ears of corn. Here was our results this year! We had 80 cups of corn!

Reminder to Fill at SA Today!

Have a Speedy Gift Card?

I just filled up at Super America, and went to pay with my Speedy Cash Gift Card, but they wouldn't take it. Good thing I had grabbed my wallet from the diaper bag!

Goodbye Speedy Rewards, Hello My SA Rewards

After a lawsuit about the name of their rewards system (Speedy), SA has come out with My SA Rewards. It works very much the same way that the Speedy Rewards works, but there are a few you might like to know.

In-Season Produce

Everyone heads to the apple orchard in the fall... why? Because that's when there are apples on the trees. Pretty much all produce has a season or month that it is harvested, which makes it cheaper in the grocery store since there is more of it to go around. Of course, it's fresher then too! Here's a list of most of the produce you would get in the grocery store and when it's "in season." With a lot of the produce you can buy it when it's cheap and freeze or can it by itself or making it into something yummy and freeze or can that. Since apples are in season now, mom and I made some delicious apple crisp with apples from a friend's trees (watch for the recipe coming in next week's Cooking the Deals post!). We baked one for dinner that night, and sent two with my brother, two with us, and mom kept three (since we eat over there a lot!)

"Buy" Prices for Diapers

A friend of mine is expecting, and asked on my Facebook wall what a good deal is for diapers. Personally, as soon as Baby E starts fitting into the cloth diapers I have, I will be switching her to those. (If you missed my post about cloth vs. disposable, you can check out the price comparisons in this post.) But, until then, I am using my stockpile of diapers.

Free $2 to CVS

Take their pledge and they will email you a coupon for $2 off your next transaction. You must have a CVS Rewards card to get this.

Free Boxelder Bug Killer

This week at Rainbow you can get free Dawn or Gain dish soap. Grab that and an old empty spray bottle, and water and you have free Boxelder bug killer!

Rolling Deal on Nesquik at Rainbow

Good Deal on Gain at Rainbow

The Coupon Network is advertising a deal on Gain from 9/11/11 - 9/24/11.

Terrific Tuesday at SA!

Fill at Super America Today!

Just a reminder post to fill at Super America today with your printable coupons!

Free Nursing Cover, Breast Pads, & Baby Sling

This is the nursing cover I ordered with the last promo code they had. I use it all the time and love it! Now here's another if you didn't get a chance last time, or if you want breast pads this time. (They weren't included in the last promo code!)

Free Stuff at the Fair

Make sure you stop by one of the information booths and grab a "Deals, Drawings, & Giveaways" pamphlet to see a greater list of freebies at the Fair, but here are some of my favorites!

It's Terrific Tuesday!

Remember to fill at Super America today and print your coupons before you go!

Check out the coupons and ways to save at the pump!

Laundry on the Cheap

I love finding new ways to save money, even if its not something I can see at a register when I'm checking out. Laundry is one household chore I have learned a few tricks to bring down my cost per load. Keep reading to find out how!